


The Lion's Share

by SilenceIsGolden15



Series: Voltron Oneshots [61]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: BAMF Keith (Voltron), Galra Keith (Voltron), Gen, Light Angst, Lonely Keith (Voltron), Mental Link, Missions Gone Wrong, Quintessence (Voltron), Team as Family, Unconsciousness, i don't think ive ever used that tag in my life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-12
Updated: 2019-11-12
Packaged: 2021-01-29 02:27:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,005
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21402658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilenceIsGolden15/pseuds/SilenceIsGolden15
Summary: In war, things go wrong sometimes. And in this case there's only one Paladin (and one Lion) left to fix it.
Relationships: Keith & Red Lion (Voltron), Keith & Shiro (Voltron)
Series: Voltron Oneshots [61]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/979428
Comments: 14
Kudos: 385





	The Lion's Share

It all started with a mission gone wrong. 

They were pinned down in a control room, lit only by the violet glow of the control panels and the deep, flashing red emergency lights. Pidge had locked the door behind them after the drones started coming, but now there were so many on the other side that the door was beginning to bow inwards. The rhythmic slams of their bodies against the metal echoed in Keith’s ears like a heartbeat, neverending and relentless. 

Pidge had been so close to getting what they needed. So close to getting them out. The rest of them were all lined up beside the door, ready to rush out and clear a path back to the Lions. But then the vents overhead had opened, and Pidge was unable to make them close again, and the air started smelling sweet. Within three dobashes all the Paladins were unconscious on the floor due to the gas-- all of them, that is, except for Keith.

He had no idea why the gas didn’t affect him. Maybe it was made not to affect Galra, so that it could be used in battles with live soldiers. The why didn’t really matter, though. What mattered was that the door was seconds from folding, his comms were full of static, and Keith was the only one left. 

He stood in the center of the room, bayard out and sword up, ready to fight. Behind him the Paladins leaned against the control panel where Keith had dragged them, positioned so that he could stand between them and the enemy, even though one body wasn’t going to mean anything against thirty drones. 

It was just him, all alone. If he failed they would all be killed or captured, or worse, and the Lions taken from them, in Zarkon’s hands. 

Keith couldn’t stop his hands from shaking. He ground his teeth and gripped his bayard until he could feel his knuckles going white, cold sweat running down his spine under his armor, and waited with bated breath for impact.

_ Bang.  _ The metal of the door creaked and groaned, bowing in. The gap where the two doors were being forced apart grew ever wider, revealing more of the magenta glow from the drones. 

_ Bang.  _ Keith jolted and shifted on his feet. “Come on, come on,” he murmured under his breath. The waiting was killing him, the adrenaline was spiraling out of control, all he wanted was for the damn thing to break already so that he wouldn’t have to  _ wait  _ anymore. 

_ BANG.  _ With one last impact the doors crumpled inwards, allowing just enough space for a single drone to slip inside. Keith went at it with everything he had, cleaving it in two with one strike, but there was one immediately behind it. Then another, and another, and in seconds they were pouring into the room, two, three drones at a time. 

He spun in desperate circles, lashing out with his bayard and shoving metal bodies to the side with his shield, but it wasn’t enough. They were getting around him. One drone had Pidge slung over its shoulder like a sack of potatoes, another had a firm grip on Hunk’s armor, and another was in the process of lifting Lance into the air. 

Letting out a ragged scream, Keith fought ever harder. Metal flew, wires sparked, the walls were riddled with scorch-marks from laser blasts and so was his armor, but no matter how many drones he knocked down, he never seemed to move. He was being overwhelmed, drowning in robot parts. 

He was losing. 

_ Red!  _ He called out in his mind.  _ Red, help me!  _ Even as he did it, he knew she wouldn’t be able to. She was parked on the other side of the ship with the other Lions, and he couldn’t ask her to just bust out and start destroying the ship. The others didn’t have their helmets on; they were all strewn across the floor like spilled M&M’s, if Red destroyed the ship and they got sucked out into the vacuum, they’d be done for. It was a hopeless cry for a hopeless situation.

But Red responded. In his mind he could feel her pressing on their bond, pressing hard, as though to move through it. 

_ Let me in,  _ he heard her say.  _ Open, Paladin.  _

He didn’t know what that meant. Vaguely he could remember something from training, months ago when they’d first formed Voltron, something about a mental block between the Lion and their Paladin. He could remember Allura saying so solemnly, “Don’t let your Lion past the wall. It’s very dangerous, the consequences could be devastating.”

Then, out of the corner of his eye, Keith saw two drones working together to lift Shiro. His head lolled back, lifeless, and every reservation Keith had gone right out the window. 

He gave in to Red. Let her push past the barrier between them, until he couldn’t tell where he ended and she began. He felt fire racing through his veins, a roar beginning in his throat, and as he retreated from his body to make room for Red, everything went golden and hazy. 

For a few seconds, he dimly watched himself act. His bayard had disappeared. In its place his hands glowed red hot, and when he drove his fist into a drone’s back it melted right through the metal. He was moving fast, faster than he thought was possible-- in seconds half of the drones had been dispatched. The tide had turned, and all the while Red was talking to him, reassuring. 

_ You are safe now,  _ she said, a proud growl in her words.  _ We are safe, together. Not alone.  _

Keith accepted it without a struggle. He was beginning to fade now; staying awake through Red’s intensity was more difficult than he’d anticipated. But he trusted her. He wasn’t scared to let go. 

_ Not alone,  _ Red repeated as his consciousness drifted away.  _ Not alone.  _

* * *

Shiro woke groggily, a headache pounding behind his eyes, fully expecting to see the dim lighting of a Galra prison cell around him. But he didn’t. What he got instead was the deeper purple of Black’s cockpit, which made absolutely no sense whatsoever. 

Fighting the nausea and dizziness, he sat up. There were stars outside Black’s windscreen, and in his ears the comms were coming alive with disoriented groans and mumbles as the other Paladins began to wake. Getting to his feet, he staggered to the pilot’s seat, only to stop dead in shock at what he saw.

Somehow, not only had he wound up in Black, Black had also wound up in space, no longer parked inside the Galra warship. From his windscreen he could see the other Lions as well, floating aimlessly like him as their pilots returned to consciousness. 

But what astounded him most was the sight of the Red Lion. It wasn’t floating like the others-- it was soaring, zipping around the warship spewing fire and magma, carving the metal into tiny pieces like a Thanksgiving turkey. The thing was almost entirely destroyed, utterly wrecked by the rage radiating off of Red like heat waves. 

“Woah,” he heard Lance say over the comms, still sounding disoriented. “Keith went to town.”

Right, Keith. Red couldn’t fly herself.

Shiro sat down in Black’s pilot seat. He was still feeling a little fuzzy, but he had to put his leader hat back on and get this mission back on track. 

“Keith?” he said, and heard Hunk give a sigh of relief at his voice. “Keith, do you copy?”

Keith didn’t answer, at least not in words, but the moment Shiro began talking Red paused in her destruction, whirling around to face them. Upon seeing the other Lions beginning to wake up she dashed over with a triumphant roar, one that somehow made Shiro’s ears ring, like it had been coming through the comms, too. 

“Alright, guys, let's get out of here.” The mission hadn’t technically been a success, but they’d all just woken up from being drugged, unsure of how they’d returned to their Lions or what exactly had happened after they passed out. Better to make a tactical retreat and try again another day. “Back to the Castle.”

No one argued with him, not even Pidge, even though she was the one who’d wanted to go after the warship to begin with. In tandem the Lions turned and headed back towards the Castle, an exhausted silence settling over them all. 

* * *

By the time they touched down in the Lion hangar Shiro’s headache had mostly dissipated. He tested the rest of his limbs on the way down the ramp, pleased to discover minimal aches and pains, and met the other Paladins on the hangar floor. 

“I’m telling you, Hunk,” Lance was saying as he approached, “One minute I was falling asleep in that control room, and the next I was waking up in Blue. I don’t remember getting there at all!”

“Neither do I,” answered Hunk, though he sounded distinctly more nervous about it. “Were we sleepwalking or something? Or maybe that gas was a memory wiper, or--”

“Does it matter?” groaned Pidge. “At least we got out alive.”

Shiro frowned at the trio. “Where’s…”

His sentence trailed off before he got a chance to finish it. He turned, looking for a sign of Keith, only to find Red sitting with her particle barrier up, blocking herself off from the rest of them. Herself and, presumably, Keith. 

Baffled, he approached the Lion, and the footsteps behind him said the others had decided to follow. 

“Keith?” he said into the comms once he got there, bracing a hand on the particle barrier. “Are you in there? It’s alright, the battle is over, you can come out now.”

Neither the barrier nor the Lion moved, and Shiro frowned in concern.

“Hey, Mullet!” Lance yelled, irritated. “What the hell are you playing at?”

Still no answer. Hunk wrung his hands and asked, “Do you think he’s hurt?” 

Shiro didn’t get a chance to answer, as Red chose that moment to start moving. The particle barrier stayed up, but Red shifted enough to put her chin on the ground and open her jaw. At first Shiro felt relieved, especially when he saw Keith’s silhouette coming down the ramp towards them. But that all vanished the moment he stepped out from the shadow of Red’s mouth.

Keith’s eyes were glowing. Shiro blinked a few times and reached under his visor to rub his eyes, but none of that changed what he was seeing. Keith’s eyes were glowing gold, like their Lions did, and maybe it was the loss of his pupils but it seemed like he was staring straight through them, no hint of recognition on his face.

“What the fuck?” Pidge exclaimed, the loudest of the reactions. “What the hell happened to him?”

“Did Red eat his soul or something?” asked Lance, sounding alarmed. 

“Aw, man, I knew something like this would happen!” Hunk wailed. “We never should have gotten involved in this Voltron thing.”

Shiro didn’t say anything. He just took a step closer to the barrier and spread his fingers, mentally willing Red to put it down and let him in. But she didn’t. Keith’s glowing eyes flicked to him, then he bared his teeth and shuffled back a few paces, a low mechanical growl rolling out of his throat.

The sound made Shiro’s breath catch. That didn’t sound like Keith-- it sounded like a Lion. Like Red. 

“Paladins?” 

Shiro spun on his heel. He’d completely forgotten that Allura would be waiting for them, but here she was, rushing into the hangar with Coran on her heels and a worried expression on her face. 

“What’s going on in here?”

“Something’s wrong with Keith,” Hunk answered before Shiro could. Allura didn’t ask for any further explanation, just rushed forward to the barrier. Her jaw dropped when she reached it, and Coran let out a strangled gasp.

“Oh, Keith,” Allura breathed, “What have you done?” 

Keith just looked at her, yellow eyes narrowed in suspicion, and turned away.

“What’s happening, Allura?” Shiro asked, not caring about how desperate he sounded. 

“What happened during the battle?” she countered. “Something terrible must have happened for Keith to resort to this.”

“I don’t remember.” The admission came with a guilty swallow. “The Galra gassed us with something and we passed out. When we woke up we were in our Lions and Red was wrecking the whole ship.”

Coran stepped forward, placing a hand on Shiro’s shoulder to get his attention. “Was Keith rendered unconscious as well?”

Shiro frowned. “I’m… not sure. I assumed he was, but I didn’t see it. Did anyone else?”

One by one the other Paladins shook their heads, and Allura’s jaw set. 

“This is very bad,” she said, and if Shiro hadn’t been freaking out before, he definitely was now. “It seems Keith allowed Red to merge their quintessence together. We must separate them, before Keith’s mind is irreparably damaged.”

“How?”

Allura hesitated. “Perhaps with the headbands,” she began, “and the Paladin bond,” but if she said anything else Shiro didn’t hear. He was being distracted by Black tugging on their bond, trying to tell him something. 

_ Let us,  _ she was saying,  _ let us help. Let us talk to her. _

“Princess,” he said, cutting her off in the middle of a sentence. “Black is saying the Lions can help. Do you think that’s a good idea?”

Allura gnawed on her lower lip, sending a doubtful glance back at Keith, still prowling behind the crimson particle barrier. 

“I’m wary; it’s possible the rest of you would get stuck with your Lions, too.”

_ No,  _ said Black in Shiro’s mind.  _ Our sister is scared. Lonely. We can help. _

Heart in his throat, Shiro relayed this information to the Princess. After a moment’s consideration, she gave a reluctant sigh and stepped back from the particle barrier. 

“You can try.” 

In seconds Pidge was at his side, a determined glint in her eye. “Just tell us what to do, Shiro.”

Lance came up on his other side, with Hunk on the other side of Pidge. Surprisingly enough, none of them looked scared. 

“Um,” said Shiro, oh-so-eloquently. “Just listen to your Lions, I guess.”

He felt Black purr, apparently pleased with his statement, then she began to press against him. Shiro instinctively resisted-- even with her, even after all of their bonding, he still tended to keep everything at an arms length, not wanting anyone to see how messed up he was inside. But Black went gently slipping in bit by bit, and eventually they clicked together in a burst of stardust. 

The room was hazy and golden when he opened his eyes. The other Paladins looked up, all of their eyes glowing, but he wasn’t alarmed. He trusted Black to lead them, and lead them she did, all eight of them simultaneously reaching out for Red and her Paladin. 

Pain sparked between them at the first touch, swift like burned fingertips. In his mind Shiro saw an image of Red, feet braced and growling, and at the same time saw Keith with his defensive, closed off posture. 

_ Sister,  _ Black rumbled out through Shiro’s throat. Dimly he heard the other Lions, all chiming in,  _ Sister,  _ as they called out to Red. Shiro searched the mass of tangled quintessence for a sign of Keith, could feel the others doing the same, but couldn’t find any. 

Another image came. This time it was of Red, floating inert in her barrier on a Galra ship. Layered beneath it was Keith’s desert shack, small and lonely beneath the wide blue sky. 

_ Alone,  _ Red said to all of them, half-beseeching and half-accusing. In it Shiro thought he heard Keith’s voice. 

Black and the other Lions sang out to her in soothing tones. It didn’t stop another scene from coming, two events superimposed over each other. The figure of the Altean king, crumbling to the ground at Zarkon’s feet, and a rocket taking off. 

“I’m sorry,” said Shiro. It wasn’t Black talking to Red then, or some strange combination of Lion and Paladin-- it was just Shiro, reaching for Keith. He caught a glimpse of him in the dust storm of red quintessence that surrounded them all, giving him the courage to press forward, and the Lions echoed him. 

_ Sorry, we’re sorry, Sister.  _

“Brother,” Pidge said, and in his mind Shiro could see her reaching out, too, green quintessence probing at red in search of an entrance point. Lance and Hunk quickly chimed in, then Shiro, all of the colors beginning to swirl together. They pressed only gently, waiting with outstretched arms for Keith to make his decision. 

Red let out a desperate whine that echoed through all of them. Then another voice joined, one that had Shiro’s spirit soaring. 

“It’s alright, Red,” said Keith, his face appearing in the maelstrom. “You’re not losing me.”

They all crashed together. It felt like merging and splitting at the same time, their consciousness returning to their bodies as the Lions fell back, relinquishing their holds, and it was disorienting. For an undetermined length of time Shiro just stayed in place, waiting for feeling to return to his fingers and for his head to stop spinning. 

Gradually, the world returned. Shiro could feel the cold of the metal hangar floor through his knee pads, the weight of his helmet, the strange texture of the flight suit on his skin. There was something on his chest, leaning on him, and when he opened his eyes to check a smile curled his lips. 

It was Keith. The particle barrier had disappeared, and all of the Paladins sat in a pile on the floor, all wrapped around a single figure in red. 

With a groan, Keith began to stir. 

“What happened?” he asked, raising his head and blinking around the room blearily. Shiro couldn’t help wrapping him up in a hug in response. 

“You saved us,” he said. “That’s what happened.” 

**Author's Note:**

> I'm gonna be posting my second bingo card soon, but don't expect numerous updates this month. I'm doing NaNoWriMo and that's sucking a lot of my creative energy


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